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February 10, 2026

Centreville Spy

Nonpartisan and Education-based News for Centreville

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Washington College Appoints Kiho Kim as Provost and Dean of the College

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Kiho Kim

Following a national search, Washington College has named Kiho Kim, Ph.D., as the institution’s provost and dean of the college. Kim will succeed Interim Provost Michael Harvey, a professor of business at Washington.

Kim earned his bachelor’s in biology and environmental science from Brock University in Canada. He completed his master’s from Florida International University followed by his Ph.D. at the University of Buffalo, both in biology and finished his post-doctoral research at Cornell University.  

Kim joins the community after an accomplished career with American University. In addition to achieving the rank of professor of environmental science, he has held a number of administrative appointments at American, including serving as the inaugural chair of the AU Scholars Program, and as executive director of the Center for Teaching, Research & Learning.  

Kim played a central role making sustainability a cornerstone of American University. He spurred growth in sustainability research and collaboration, including by leading the creation of a new Department of Environmental Science, played an instrumental role in establishing the American University Center for Environment, Community, and Equity, and was the co-principal investigator supporting the largest external grant in AU’s history to study wasted food. Kim also helped strengthen the scholar-teacher ideal by transforming AU’s Center for Teaching, Research & Learning into an innovative and inclusive faculty development center and critical hub for diversity, equity & inclusion. 

“We had a an incredibly strong pool of applicants in this search and Kiho rose to the top among outstanding academic leaders,” said Washington College President Mike Sosulski. “His passion for innovative teaching and research, and the leadership experience he brings are impressive, as is his commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion. He is a very collaborative leader and I look forward to partnering with him to strengthen the Washington College liberal arts experience for today’s students.” 

“I am deeply grateful and excited for the opportunity to be part of Washington College, an institution with an inspiring and rich history and a thriving and vibrant community of students, staff, and faculty. I look forward to working with everyone to ensure that Washington College continues to fulfill its mission to challenge and inspire emerging citizen leaders to discover lives of purpose and passion, and to further strengthen Washington College’s reputation as an outstanding liberal arts institution.”  

Kim will begin his role at the College this summer.  

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Governor Moore Visits Benedictine Campus In Ridgely

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Governor Moore interacts with student at Benedictine

Governor Wes Moore toured the Benedictine campus in Ridgely on Thursday on his way to the 2023 Maryland Association of Counties summer conference. The tour was conducted by Benedictine Executive Director Scott Evans and Education Director Julie Hickey. Joined by Maryland Department of Disabilities Secretary Carol Beatty, the tour also included members of the Benedictine leadership team, board members, Benedictine’s students, adults, family members and staff. Congressman Andy Harris’ office Community Liaison Mike Arntz; Delegate Jeff Ghrist; Senator Johnny Mautz; and Ridgely Town Commissioner Anthony Casey also joined the group.

The Governor’s tour included an opportunity to sit in on a class on the student’s first day back to school. He also visited a residential suite where Evans and Hickey explained the need to upgrade the facilities to meet the changing demographic of students who have moderate to severe autistic and behavioral challenges.

The Benedictine campus also has vocational training spaces and recreational facilities which are utilized by both students and supported adults. The Governor met supported adults who talked about their work experiences in the community and vocational activities they participate in on campus.

“All of us at Benedictine want to thank the Governor and his staff for touring Benedictine. What a great opportunity to show what we do here at Benedictine in supporting those living with developmental disabilities and autism. The Governor’s engagement with our students and supported adults was truly inspirational to witness,” commented Benedictine Executive Director Scott Evans.

The original school and residential suites were built in the early 1960’s and the Transforming a Campus to Transform Lives master plan has been developed to address obsolescence, safety, and health issues of the current and future student population that attend school and reside on campus. The first phase of the project is to renovate and construct new residential suites for the school-age population, a new nursing and kitchen facility, and new traffic access improvements.

For more information about Benedictine and how you can support this organization, ple

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Mid-Shore Education: Learning Leadership at the Summer S.T.E.M. Camp

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For several years now, the Spy has worked with Summer S.T.E.M camp volunteer coordinator Bob DeGour to profile some of the outstanding local high school students who lead this unique summer program. While the mission of the STEM camp itself is reason to put the spotlight on this innovative program, which encourages local elementary school students to spend part of their summer break to learn more about science and math, this project has always had an equally impressive impact on the rising juniors and seniors to run every aspect of the camp’s program.

From curriculum development to fundraising, these high school students are given full control over of the summer camp. While DeGour helps by offering advice to these young leaders, it was always Bob’s intention to give maximum autonomy to his leadership team to encourage self-reliance, creativity and ultimately the confidence needed to not only enrich the lives of the participants but adopt life lessons for the future.

And after five summer terms, those young leaders have taken that experience and applied to their own personal goals. Several have them have gone on to be admitted to the Naval Academy or been accepted at some of the most competitive undergraduate colleges and universities in the country.

This year, the Spy sat down with Nathan Henckel and Ariyonna Dodd to talk briefly about the 2023 camp year and its impact on both their younger students and their own personal development.

The STEM Camp is co-sponsored by the YMCA of the Chesapeake and Talbot County Public Schools.

This video is approximately three minutes in length. To learn more about the Naval Academy Summer S.T.E.M camp program please visit their Facebook page here.

 

 

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Mid-Shore Education: Empowering Parents in Dorchester

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The nonprofit organization Moving Dorchester Forward, based in Cambridge, started as a group of local leaders concerned about the holes in the resources and services available to the community. They chose to concentrate on three areas: early learning, workforce development, and community engagement. The task of getting area citizens involved in what MDF was doing began with Community Engagement Coordinator Shay Lewis-Sisco and her team holding events to create awareness of MDF.

While they were out there, the team asked people what the community was missing and how MDF could connect them to vital resources. It quickly became clear that money, activities, personnel, and action planning (among other things) were sorely needed, so MDF decided to be the conduit to those services. One of the questions the organization asked themselves was, “What are the capacity-building skills for parents?”

Fortunately, they learned about the Parent Encouragement Program from Kevin Beverly, Moving Dorchester Forward’s board president. Beverly, who lives and works in Montgomery County, knew of the PEP group that has been active there for twenty years, meeting with parents and caregivers of children ages 3-18 and then teaching them skills in cohort-based environments.

“A lot of them are parents sitting there going, ‘How do you talk to a teenager, and how do you get them on regular routines’ and all that fun stuff,” explained MDF director Chris Wheedleton. “Particularly for folks that are working two jobs and maybe single-parent homes and all these extra challenges for them from a parent standpoint.”

PEP wanted to work in another community besides Montgomery County, so they came to Dorchester with a grant and the Family Resiliency Program, which helps families learn how to communicate with their children and generally balance the things in their lives.

MDF decided to conduct two pilot programs. Though PEP’s model typically relies on virtual classes, Wheedleton and his team chose to begin theirs in person. The first session of the initial cohort was held on February 7 at Delmarva Community Services Intergenerational Center, with Lewis-Sisco and another community engagement staff member as facilitators.

“We wanted to do it in person simply because it’s about building relationships, and it’s hard to build relationships when you’re doing that in a virtual environment,” said MDF Coordinator Nancy Shockley, who oversees PEP. “We were willing to do the structure and set up whatever we needed to do in terms of the food, in terms of the daycare and facilitation and stuff like that.”

Parents were able to take their children to the in-person session, where the kids were placed in groups by age to work with the community engagement staff while the parents focused fully on their own group. But, there were also challenges with everyone meeting in one place: the time of day they all could gather, activities parents needed to accomplish at home or elsewhere, and the difficulties of transportation.

So, MDF gave the attendees the option of having the sessions online, and the next time they met it was on Zoom, which turned out to work well. The second cohort ran from April to June and was fully virtual. It was offered in two groups of sessions, on Thursdays and Sundays. Any parents who wanted to participate but didn’t have the necessary equipment were provided with it by MDF.

The topics for the eight weeks of sessions, outlined by PEP, were very relatable and included helping a child manage change, raising more motivated and cooperative kids, knowing when to set limits, and responding to a child’s strong emotions. The facilitator would show an instructional video that presented simple tools parents could implement within their families. This would be followed by some specific questions, and the group members would hold a discussion about such things as how their own parents responded to them during difficult incidents of their childhood. There were talks about the three parenting styles–permissive, democratic, and authoritarian–and why the democratic style was the preferred one.

Then there were the discussions of mental health, which children need support with no matter their age or stage of development. Because of generational differences among the parents, there were some for whom the normalizing of mental health was a challenge.

“I will say that, in one session, I felt that culturally, specifically around mental health, there was some tension at times,” said Lewis-Sisco. But, it was her job to set the tone of the conversation, and she made sure everyone knew each session was a safe, confidential environment for difficult dialogues. “As a facilitator, you have to be intentional to make sure that, no matter what the culture is or race that’s present, they have the space to be able to share their experience. And I often say, in facilitated conversations we need to attack the problem, not the person.”

As the group members talked and realized that everyone was being open and transparent, they were willing to continue the engagements and connect on a whole new level. The parents found themselves looking forward to the sessions as their own form of mental health support. While the facilitator would play videos and ask the hard questions, it was up to the parents to provide each other with encouragement. Some of them even learned to be leaders themselves.

“And then from there, we’ve actually been able, through the first cohorts, to identify additional facilitators,” said Shockley, “because the whole idea of using that PEP model is that parents who go through the program can potentially become facilitators of the ongoing groups, which is really just building the capacity and giving parents sort of that peer sort of network opportunity of working together.”

When the cohorts were finished, MDF brought the parents together for a family fun night event at Cabin Fever in Downtown Cambridge. They were able to meet with author Joy Thomas Moore, mother of Maryland’s governor, for some family engagement activities and discussions.

“Both groups that went through said, ‘What’s next? We’d like to keep going,'” said Wheedleton. “And we just met with PEP recently and they said, ‘We’ve got additional funding to actually do eight more cohorts next year.'”

He and Shockley are now planning that with Lewis-Sisco, who will take the lead on the structure of the ongoing Family Resiliency cohorts to commence in the fall. At the same time, they are able to offer the parents other programming focused on such subjects as mental health, first aid, and finances.

“So many of these families are working two jobs and are struggling to make ends meet,” said Shockley. “And that makes parenting even more difficult because of the ongoing stresses of trying to pay the bills and meet all of those things. So, we’ve actually had a number of those parents sign up to participate in some of our other work around generational poverty and how to kind of take the next step and move on.”

For more information on PEP’s Family Resiliency Program or to sign up for the next sessions, contact Shay Lewis-Sisco at [email protected] or 443-440-5370.

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Blueprint Board Approves Updates to Statewide Reform Plan

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The Blueprint for Maryland’s Future Accountability and Implementation Board has approved updates to the statewide comprehensive education reform plan, on schedule with a law that calls for the massive plan to be revised each year by Aug. 1.

Some changes the board made Tuesday were discussed July 20, such as requiring local health and social service agencies to share with local school systems the names and contact information of families with children who could be eligible to enroll in free prekindergarten.

This and other revisions — which were recommended by staff of the state Department of Education and other state agencies, as well as by local school leaders, parents and other stakeholders — focus on most of the Blueprint’s priorities: expanding early childhood education, hiring and retaining high-quality and diverse teachers, preparing students for college and technical careers and providing additional resources for students in need.

The other priority is governance and accountability for the Blueprint board, also known as the AIB, that was established by lawmakers to oversee the education reform plan until 2032. The board decided that, together with the Department of Education, they will develop a framework to identify areas of technical assistance that need to be provided to school systems and what agencies should provide it.

“I just feel like this process has worked extremely well and that we’ve been very open and accommodated the input that has come from a variety of different quarters,” said Blueprint Board Vice Chair William “Brit” Kirwan, chancellor emeritus of the University System of Maryland.

Blueprint Board Chair Isiah “Ike” Leggett, who served three terms as Montgomery County’s executive, said the work isn’t over, with another meeting scheduled for Aug. 10.

“This is an important document, but it’s a document to some degree [that] will be subject to changes as we look at new approaches to education and new changes that need to be made,” he said. “We have put in an awful lot of work and we’re still not through. We’ve accomplished a great deal with all our supporting personnel and organizations that have worked with us.”

Last week, the Blueprint board approved all 24 school systems’ first submissions of local reform plans.

Most counties have already planned to increase salaries for teachers, prepare to expand prekindergarten opportunities for 3- and 4-year-old children and provide career counseling for middle and high school students.

The plans also detail how local officials will implement Blueprint strategies through the upcoming 2023-24 school year.

Some members of the AIB praised a couple of school systems for their work during an online meeting Thursday.

Kirwan said that Anne Arundel County public schools’ plan to expand the number teachers to achieve National Board Certification “really stands out.”

AIB Executive Director Rachel Hise said Anne Arundel has one of the highest number of teachers with that credential in Maryland.

Blueprint Boardmember Joseph Manko said Frederick County’s plan to create a teacher pipeline with higher education institutions should be replicated by other school systems.

“Teacher shortages are a challenge across the state, but it seems like in Frederick County there’s been a really deep connection with their local institutes of higher education,” he said.

Between May 20 and June 25, each local school system received two rounds of feedback from staff of the AIB and the state Department of Education.

Twenty school systems received unanimous approval last week for their local reform plans. Calvert, Charles and Garrett counties need to amend documentation on a Career and Counseling Memorandum of Understanding.

Queen Anne’s also received unanimous approval, on the condition that it convert $1,000 teacher stipends from the current and two previous fiscal years into the base salary for all teachers. The stipends were paid because school officials realized they couldn’t provide a 10% increase for teachers this fiscal year, as required by the Blueprint law.

Each school system’s plan will provide a roadmap for local school officials to receive assistance from staff of various agencies as they prepare documents that outline strategies through the 2026-27 school years and in order to submit them to the board by March.

Meanwhile, the AIB made available summaries of each approved school system’s plans along with feedback from AIB staff specifying “areas of strength and opportunity” and “areas for further growth and improvement.”

Here’s a snapshot of the feedback for each school district on the Mid-Shore

Caroline – Strength: “Caroline County provided comprehensive responses in its implementation plan overall, but particularly in describing its K-12 mathematics and literacy instructional plans. Caroline’s process for identifying and selecting both high-quality and culturally responsive instructional materials by utilizing the MABE [Maryland Association of Boards of Education] equity lens and evaluating potential materials against a culturally responsive scorecard is particularly noteworthy. AIB staff look forward to following Caroline’s progress in forming a workgroup to identify specific criteria for culturally responsive materials in the 2023-24 academic year.”

Improvement: “Caroline’s implementation of CTE [career and technical education] programs could benefit from a greater focus on opportunities that CTE pathways present for students to attain high-wage, high-skill jobs. This could also help to encourage more students to pursue industry credentials and enroll in high school apprenticeships.”

Dorchester – Strength: “DCPS is expanding its pipeline of teachers through partnerships with the Teacher Academy of Maryland (TAM) program, Chesapeake College, and Salisbury University with a specific focus on efforts that will diversify the teaching force to better mirror the student body. Continue to seek solutions to fill hard to staff positions through these and additional collaborations.”

Improvement: “DCPS describes how staffing challenges are impacting implementation throughout the plan, including professional development and supporting students who are not yet meeting college and career [readiness] (CCR) expectations.  As strategies are developed to overcome these challenges, DCPS has the opportunity to consider creative approaches that will position the district as an early innovator in implementing the Blueprint, particularly with regards to meeting career ladder expectations. Such strategies could include teacher leaders returning to teaching for part of the day while creating, leading and monitoring professional development efforts; using high quality, school day tutoring funded through grants; and reallocating central office staffing to ensure teachers are in the classroom and students are receiving necessary support, etc.”

Kent – Strength: “Given Kent’s need to provide CCR [college and career readiness] support for very large numbers of students, the LEA [local education agency] has some strong structures in place now to build on including their Trojan Time period (to offer support/enrichment during the school day) and the summer programming that combines academic catchup with CTE exploration.  The LEA [local education agency] is thinking about the support it provides as needing to be engaging to students [and] Kent County is collaborating with neighboring Cecil County to organize community schools.”

Improvement: “Like most LEAs, Kent’s focus on the career ladder to date has been on supporting teachers working to achieve National Board Certification.  The district needs to think through how to structure new teacher roles and organize staffing to better serve students in their schools.  The LEA will benefit from technical assistance and guidance to develop a career ladder that goes beyond a focus on National Board Certification/salary incentives and leverages teacher leadership to improve teaching and learning.”

Queen Anne’s – Strength: “Queen Anne’s has created a continuous improvement process for their dual enrollment program. Data on how students perform prior to and in their dual enrollment courses will be used to help future students navigate whether to participate and which classes to take and help shape their partnerships with IHEs (institutions of higher education).”

Improvement: “QACPS has historically had trouble staffing math, world language, and secondary science teachers; recent shortages and decreasing enrollment in teacher preparation programs have made it hard for them to staff special education, elementary, and secondary positions in all levels. Queen Anne’s actively recruits at a number of events, but because of these shortages, the LEA [local education agency] needs to consider additional strategies to build strong teacher and teaching assistant pipelines, including through new recruitment and retention strategies (especially those targeting historically underrepresented populations).”

Talbot – Strength: “There is a comprehensive plan and commitment to monitoring key data and intervening early for students who are not on track as they enter high school, including an organizational audit to look for connections between policies and practices that either support or hinder student success [and] partnering with neighboring counties to collaborate on cross-county CTE [career and technical education] program offerings to broaden student options.”

Improvement: “As a smaller county, Talbot faces a number of challenges in Blueprint implementation including expanding early childhood education options (no private providers and no 3 [year] olds enrolled currently) and attracting the needed mix of teachers, support staff, and English Learner specialists. These were acknowledged and strategies were discussed but will need ongoing attention.”

 

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New Director Takes The Helm At Chesapeake College Cambridge Center

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Dr. Lorelly Solano is combining her interests in education and public policy in her new role as director of the Chesapeake College Cambridge Center.

“I enjoyed working directly with the students — hearing about their dreams and learning about their challenges while I’ve helped them plan their academic journeys,” said Dr. Solano. “This new role will be a bit different for me, but I will try to bring that student perspective into everything I do here.”

Dr. Lorelly Solano

As director of the center, located on Race Street, Dr. Solano will lead the staff in providing all the services Cambridge-based students need to be successful. In the coming months, Cambridge residents are likely to meet Dr. Solano as she begins her community outreach efforts.

The Cambridge Center, Dr. Solano said, is a resource for everyone in Dorchester County, playing a critical role in the economic and social health of the downtown area.

In addition to credit classes in both transfer and career programs, the center also offers workforce training, personal enrichment opportunities and meeting spaces for community organizations. The center also houses the American Job Center.

“We’re an education center for students of all ages, but I hope residents here also see us as a center of community growth,” Dr. Solano said.

Dr. Solano first joined Chesapeake as an English as a Second Language instructor. She was later the academic and career advisor guiding students through actionable plans to achieve their goals.

A native of Costa Rica, Dr. Solano came to the United States as a graduate student.  After earning her bachelor’s degree in Costa Rica, she worked for an international flower exporter as she continued her studies toward licensure at the University of Costa Rica.

Her future plans took a turn when a professor at UCR asked if she was adventurous.   Thinking that the professor meant bungee jumping or some other daredevil sport, Dr. Solano prepared to decline. Instead, the professor asked if she would be interested in taking on a new academic challenge in a different country. He recommended her for a graduate research post at the University of Maryland.

While working on “green” roof research and earning her master’s degree in natural resources science at College Park, Dr. Solano’s interest grew in building sustainable communities through policy and education.

She went on to earn a Ph.D. in public policy and urban affairs at the University of Delaware.

“It’s ironic that I studied urban affairs and ended up in rural area,” Dr. Solano said. “Rural and urban areas face many of the same challenges, though, and people in both areas want the same things.”

Better lives and a greater sense of community, Dr. Solano said, are common desires for most people. The Cambridge Center provides both, she said.

For more information about the Chesapeake College Cambridge Center, please visit www.chesapeake.edu/cambridge

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Blueprint: Oversight Board Approves First Reform Plans for All MD School Systems

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The Blueprint for Maryland’s Future Accountability and Implementation Board approved all 24 school systems’ initial plans as part of the state’s goal to reform public education.

The documents approved Thursday are the first submission of Blueprint plans, summarizing the reform work that is complete, currently underway or that will be implemented through the 2023-24 school year.

All documents include details on the Blueprint’s focus on early childhood education, hiring and retaining high-quality and diverse teachers, preparing students for college and technical careers and providing additional resources for students in need.

Board Chair Isiah “Ike” Leggett thanked employees at the implementation board and the state Department of Education and members of the state Board of Education for Thursday’s vote, which he called a “significant achievement.”

“This is truly a milestone, but it’s only one major step in a long series of steps,” he said. “There’s an awful lot of work ahead. We put in an awful lot of long time and effort to get to this point.”

Before the seven-member board, also known as the AIB, voted during its online session, Leggett suggested that each school system plan be voted on separately.

The first 20 school system plans were approved unanimously.

Boardmember Jennifer Lynch recused herself from voting on Baltimore County’s Blueprint plan. She works as acting director of the county’s Department of Economic and Workforce Development.

Blueprint Boardmember Justin Robinson recused himself from voting on the Prince George’s County Public Schools plan because he works as a teacher in that school system.

The next three school systems — Calvert, Charles and Garrett — received conditional approval because officials in those jurisdictions must revise documentation on a Career Counseling Memorandum of Understanding (MOU).

Rachel Hise, executive director of the Blueprint board, said one example for the conditional approval is missing job descriptions.

The board voted unanimously to approve, conditionally, Blueprint plans from those three school districts.

Queen Anne’s County’s school district also received conditional approval, because school officials in that Eastern Shore county realized they couldn’t meet a requirement in the Blueprint law to provide a 10% salary increase for teachers in this fiscal year.

Instead, the school district provided $1,000 stipends for teachers in fiscal years 2022 and 2023 and again this current fiscal year.

Part of the stipulation for approval, according to a motion from the AIB: convert and incorporate the stipend into the base salary for all teachers so “the salary increase will be properly reflected in pension calculations and any other calculations that are dependent on salary.”

With all 24 school systems’ Blueprint plans approved from this first submission, the implementation board can release Blueprint funds for this current fiscal year.

A summary on the approved plans is on the AIB website.

Next steps

School officials must submit a second set of education reform planning documents, by March of next year, that detail strategies to accomplish the Blueprint priorities through the 2026-27 school years.

The third and final submission must be turned in to the state in 2027 to cover plans between the 2027-28 school year and 2031-32.

Hise noted some common strengths from all 24 local school system plans, including support for prekindergarten expansion and enrollment, creating new partnerships with state agencies and other organizations and developing career counseling programs for middle and high school students.

Some improvements school systems could make, she said, include developing career ladders for staff, developing and implementing math and literacy plans and assessing how to support students who aren’t college and career ready by the 10th grade.

Hise said staff with the AIB, state Department of Education and other state agencies will provide technical assistance before a second submission of Blueprint plans are due in March.

Later in the meeting, the AIB reviewed recommendations to update the statewide Blueprint comprehensive plan that focused on college and career readiness, additional resources for students and governance and accountability.

Some of their recommendations include having the state Department of Education develop resources for local school districts to disseminate information on updated college and career readiness standards; providing “research-based” programs to recruit and train English as a Second Language and bilingual teachers; and having department officials provide Blueprint recommendations on local school system plans by June of every year.

Several people provided online suggestions for the Blueprint board in areas such as arts education, which they noted is mentioned in the Code of Maryland Regulations, also known as COMAR.

“The arts are a critical part of a world-class education, including but not limited to supporting children’s academic development, social and emotional wellbeing, and sense of belonging,” wrote Julia Di Bussolo, executive director of Arts Every Day in Baltimore. “The AIB’s inclusion of the arts, and all required subjects in COMAR, is an important step in ensuring that all students in Maryland receive a truly world-class education.”

The implementation board will hold a special meeting Tuesday to discuss and approve updates to the statewide comprehensive plan, which was first approved in December.

By William J. Ford

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CBMM Debuts Museum Masters Summer Camp

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CBMM’s Exhibition Designer & Projects Manager Jim Koerner leads students in the Museum Masters summer camp on a tour of the new Welcome Center.

Caiden Sackett carefully stuck a long drawer back into a library card catalog cabinet and turned attention toward a thick blue book filled with hundreds of pages of journal entries from a 19th-century schooner captain.

“I feel like I’m on a scavenger hunt,” the 12-year-old from Easton said to his buddy Kenton Baynard.

The middle-school research partners were trying to learn all they could about a brass inkwell shaped like an alligator as part of Museum Masters summer camp at the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum.

Over the past two weeks, the newest offering in CBMM’s Summer Camp lineup gave children a unique look at CBMM’s extensive collection and a crash course on the responsibilities of a museum curator from artifact care to exhibition design.

Utilizing the newly renovated Norman & Ellen Plummer Center for Museum Collections, the Museum Masters campers used library materials and electronic resources to research real collection objects. They applied what they learned to create informational labels for the artifacts and combined their work to create an exhibition to share with their families and friends at an open house to close the week.

“I didn’t really know what to expect, but it’s so much fun,” said 12-year-old Ella Eckholm of Easton. “I thought it was just going to be going behind the scenes of the museum, but it’s way more than that. I love it.”

For CBMM, it was an opportunity to reach a different audience with its summer programming by creating a camp that showcased its enhanced collections and research space and shared the expertise of its curatorial staff with the next generation.

“I’m really proud of the impact that Museum Masters has had on the campers who participated,” CBMM Vice President of Education & Interpretation Jill Ferris said. “It’s very common for a museum to be a space where kids and families can come and have an enjoyable time, but what’s pretty unique about this is that the campers are able to delve into our collections and conduct real research to investigate what is interesting to them.”

The new camp – with one week geared toward grades 4-6 and the other grades 6-9 – was a collaboration between CBMM’s education and curatorial teams.

Museum Educator Alyssa Zajan leaned on a master’s degree in Museum Studies and assistance from Director of Curatorial Affairs & Exhibitions Jen Dolde, Museum Collections Specialist Gabriella Cantelmo, and Registrar Amanda Wachowiak to create age-appropriate lesson plans. Together, the team combed through CBMM’s collection of more than 80,000 artifacts to identify research options that would both interest and engage the campers.

Beyond the exhibition creation project, the highlights included a field trip day (one group went to Easton’s Academy Art Museum and the other to the Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad Visitor Center in Dorchester County), an afternoon of kayaking, a tour of CBMM’s under-construction Welcome Center led by Exhibition Designer & Projects Manager Jim Koerner, and time for the sort of fun and games that are a hallmark of summer camps everywhere.

“We’ve all talked about how this is the camp we would’ve wanted to go to as children,” Zajan said. “Creating it, we were guided by, ‘What would we have wanted to do when we were that age?’”

Dolde was eager to share all the ways that the Plummer Center can be used for historical research to tell stories about the history and culture of the Chesapeake Bay region.

In one particularly enlightening lesson, Dolde showed the children how to use a card catalog and then find their selections within the rows of books in the Howard I. Chapelle Library. When she asked the middle school group if anyone had ever seen a card catalog, one girl spoke up and said she remembered seeing one in the 1985 classic movie “The Breakfast Club.”

In today’s world, digital research is, of course, just as important, and Dolde also explained how to navigate CBMM’s online collections portal and take nuggets gleaned there into searching the wider web for reliable sources.

“We’re sharing a whole wider world of how to investigate history,” Dolde said. “It’s very different than just writing a paper.”

The result was fresh research into the chosen artifacts, many of which have been part of the collection for decades, and a chance to improve the information within their digital record.

In one case during the opening week, 10-year-old Carter Woody picked a purse, crab picking tools, and a glove that were originally catalogued without much additional information. Thanks to the camper’s research, the digital file now includes a photo of crab picker Fannie McCain Brooks and new details about her 35 years working in the industry in Hampton, Va.

“That is what this camp is all about,” Ferris said. “They are doing real research with real objects in our real collection, and it’s had a real impact on our understanding of life in the Chesapeake.”

The artifacts the children picked spanned a wide spectrum of topics, locations, and eras of Chesapeake history, from a hand drill used for boat building, to a small decorative decoy, to a fishing trophy, to a Bay-themed license plate.

A member of CBMM’s Rising Tide after-school program, Eckholm picked a 1930s oyster shucking knife that was believed to be used by inspectors in Maryland’s Fishery Force, sparking a weeklong journey into the world of oystering.

Hudson Loveday was intrigued by a small lantern. The 13-year-old from Bethesda, Md., came to learn that it was a running light off a World War I power boat with a file that included a scan of a hand-written note from the donor Herman A. Hobelmann asking CBMM to accept it into its collection in 1975.

“I wanted to come because it sounded like fun,” Loveday said. “Definitely different than a chess or sports camp. Not a lot of places would offer something like this.”

For the 19 students who participated across the two weeks, it was an opportunity to start building research skills that will be useful in class projects going forward and perhaps one day even a career.

Caiden Sackett and Kenton Baynard were up for the challenge, diving in to learn more about their brass alligator’s owner Capt. Leonard Tawes and his schooner City of Baltimore.

After leafing through the collection of Tawes’ journal entries, “Coasting Captain,” published in 1967, they headed off to collections storage with Dolde and Zajan to have a look at a painting of City of Baltimore that they thought might yield more clues.

“It’s about putting the dots together,” Sackett said. “You learn one thing and then there’s another thing that goes off of that and you keep going until you find the end piece.”

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Jafari, Nagel to Lead Chesapeake College Board of Trustees

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A. Reza Jafari

A. Reza Jafari of Talbot County is the new chair of the Chesapeake College Board of Trustees. 

Mr. Jafari, a trustee since 2018, now leads the 10-member body charged with oversight at Chesapeake. Milton Nagel of Caroline County will serve as the vice chair. 

“I am honored to chair the Chesapeake College Board of Trustees and will do my utmost in diligently working with College leadership in serving our five Counties and delivering on our committed stewardship of students’ success,” said Mr. Jafari. 

In addition to his role with the Board of Trustees, Mr. Jafari is a board member of the Maryland Association of Community Colleges. He also serves on the Association of Community College Trustees (ACCT) Government Relations and Policy Committee and as the ACCT State Coordinator for Maryland;, and a board member of the India, China, and America Institute. 

Mr. Jafari is the Chairman, CEO and Founder of e-Development International. Based in Easton, e-Development International is an executive advisory group that promotes, facilitates and participates in Information and Communication Technology (ICT) initiatives for transformational leadership, social entrepreneurships and change, strategic alliances and ecosystems development, connected healthcare, e-education, smart cities and connected communities. 

Mr. Jafari succeeds Robert Grace, whose term as chair ended July 1. He worked closely with Dr. Clifford Coppersmith to guide Chesapeake out of the Covid-19 pandemic. 

Of Mr. Grace’s tenure as Board chair, President Coppersmith said, “Bob’s leadership allowed Chesapeake to weather the unprecedented challenges to the institution during a global pandemic. Throughout his time with the board, he has been a critical link to the region’s business community. Bob is keenly aware of Chesapeake’s role in preparing the local workforce and bolstering economic development on the Eastern Shore.” 

Chesapeake’s Board of Trustees is comprised of two members from each of the five support counties. Members are appointed to five-year terms by the governor. 

For information about the Chesapeake College Board of Trustees, please visit
https://www.chesapeake.edu/about/board

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Breaking Down The Blueprint: The Challenges School Districts Face in Meeting Students’ Behavioral Health Needs

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Lori Morrow says for the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future education reform plan to work effectively, schools must ensure students receive the mental health services they need.

Morrow, the mother of two children and education advocate from Prince George’s County, said school-based health centers should be created and staffed with mental health professionals accessible for students and their families, especially in rural and underserved communities.

“We want kids to be in school. It’s a lot easier to be in school when you’re healthy,” said Morrow, who served her last day Friday as a member of the state Board of Education. “COVID has taken a toll on everybody. We need to have the right mental health…support so that our teachers can focus on education and teaching curriculum.”

As part of the Blueprint process, education officials in all of Maryland’s 24 school systems must outline how they will fulfill the plan’s fourth “pillar,” or priority: how they will provide resources for all students to be successful.

Some of the Blueprint requirements include additional per pupil funding for special education students and English language learners, awarding personnel grants for schools with at least 55% of students on free and reduced lunch, and requiring school systems to provide annual training for staff to recognize mental health and behavioral issues in students.

The legislature approved House Bill 770 this, year which includes allowing a school counselor to join the state’s Consortium on Coordinated Community Supports, a group established as part of the Blueprint law with one of its main goals to expand access to behavioral and wraparound services for students and their families.

Mental and behavioral health have been major topics not only in Maryland but nationwide.

U.S Surgeon General Vivek Murthy issued an advisory last month about how social media “can also have a profound risk of harm to the mental health and well-being of children and adolescents.”

Liz Zogby, co-lead with the Maryland Down Syndrome Advocacy Coalition, wants to make sure children with intellectual and developmental disabilities aren’t forgotten in the Blueprint plan.

“There’s a lot of attention and detail that’s been focused on racial diversity and socioeconomic diversity, and absolutely rightly so. We have to make sure that that focus on equity also includes kids with disabilities,” she said. “They’re a critical piece for our schools.”

In the meantime, the Blueprint’s Accountability and Implementation Board could start approving local school system’s plans to provide mental health services beginning on July 20.

Each document, first submitted in March, must include work school officials conducted, completed and will continue to implement through the 2023-24 school year. Besides resources for students, the other main priorities include providing early childhood education, hiring and retaining high-quality and diverse teachers and preparing students for college and technical careers.

In their initial reports, local officials responded to several questions and statements about student resources with a focus on health.

To provide insight into how school districts are planning to support student behavioral health, we have gathered responses to one of the section’s questions: “Discuss the challenges that exist in meeting students’ behavioral health needs and how the [local education agency] overcomes these challenges. Include strategies related to funding, specialized staff, community partnerships, etc.”

Below are all or part of the responses from the school districts.

Allegany – “ACPS has recognized the major challenge of providing immediate direct services to students who need mental health counseling. In our rural district, community providers are limited and overwhelmed with few providers offering pediatric services. To help overcome this, over the last three years, ACPS has strategically increased our in-house capacity to deliver services while strengthening our community partnerships.

Increased school-based staffing:

  • Additional staffing in 2022-2023 through a combination of Concentration of Poverty,

CARES, and local funding: A licensed was addictions counselor added to the RESTART/alternative

Program; reduced ratio of mental health specialists one for every two schools; additional elementary behavior specialist.

  • Multiple mental health Board approved supervisors able to increase oversight and clinical skill development.
  • Two behavior specialists are working towards becoming Board Certified Behavior Analysts.
  • Deeper collaboration/partnership with Health Department counselors post-COVID.
  • Partnering with the Maryland School Mental Health Response Program for training, program enhancement, needs assessment, and professional development.”

Programs Purchased:

  • Second Step: SEL K-8 including bullying prevention facilitated by school counselors.
  • Ripple Effects: facilitated through the RESTART program and behavior specialists for Tier II/III students.”

Anne Arundel – “The stigma around mental health remains a challenge in Anne Arundel County. Many families feel ashamed to admit their child may need behavioral health support. This can lead to students being afraid to talk about their mental health struggles at home and leading them into further despair. For that reason, AACPS has collaborated with community partners on initiatives designed to overcome the stigma around mental health. These programs include:

  • The Sound of Silence is a school assembly and community program by the Northern Lights Against Substance Use. The program discusses mental health and substance abuse and how they are tied together. There are members of child and family serving agencies throughout Anne Arundel County on the panel answering questions for students and families.
  • AACPS also has a club called Student Alliance for Flourishing, a partnership between AACPS and Notre Dame University of Maryland. This club thrives at five high schools and three middle schools and focuses on teaching students to flourish mentally and physically. It reduces stigma by teaching students how to succeed in school, community and globally.”

Baltimore City – “City Schools has continued to strengthen its behavioral health supports for students, including the allocation of at least one social worker in each traditional school and the development of coordinated Student Wellness Support Teams (SWST) at the school level. The greatest challenge City Schools currently faces in meeting students’ behavioral health needs is the shortage of providers – social workers, school psychologists, school nurses, school counselors, and other related services providers. City Schools is currently addressing this challenge through external partnerships with local and state organizations, and we are intentionally creating internal partnerships through our Student Wellness support Teams to maximize the collaboration and impact of the related services staff in each school. Related services staff, specifically social workers and school psychologists, are integral members of the SWST which works to proactively meet schools’ overall climate and culture needs. The formation of the SWST has increased the collaboration among its members; specifically, those staff who support behavioral health. As a part of SWST, social workers lead the completion of the school wellness needs assessments in the beginning of the year. This data assists in providing support that is targeted and reflective of the individual schools’ needs.”

Baltimore County – “Supporting Students’ Behavioral Health by identifying challenges and appropriate strategies to address challenges has continued to be prioritized in BCPS. The growth of access to resources, including school counselors, psychologists and social workers has continued to expand with increased staffing as well as increased community partnerships with community mental health providers, mental health organizations and the local department of behavioral health. The focus on student behavioral health has forged community collaboration resulting in the Mental Health Advisory Council.

The BCPS Mental Health Advisory Council (MHAC) that is representative of all stakeholders, identified various challenges with specificity around awareness and access to the tiered system of supports that includes access points to mental health supports for students across schools, the measurement of success of the interventions in each tier, understanding the gaps in services, equitable and accessible supports and services, and what determinants inform professional learning.”

Calvert – “CCPS is experiencing a shortage of mental health professionals due to the national shortage.There are not enough school psychologists and school social workers in our schools. In addition, our county health department school-based therapists are not fully staffed in our schools. The Calvert County Health department continues to attempt to recruit more staff to better support our schools. Strategies to overcome these challenges are to provide increased salaries, reimbursement for license renewal, and funding for attendance at professional development. Currently we require social workers to have their Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW-C) but we are considering changing this requirement to a Licensed Master Social Worker (LMSW) in order to be able to pull from a bigger pool of applicants. We will have some discussions of whether an Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor (LCPC) should be considered as an applicant. School Psychologists with Nationally Certified School Psychologist certification receive an annual salary adjustment of $2,500 [and] social workers with LCSW-C certification receive an annual salary adjustment of $2,500, provided certification [for both are] in good standing.”

Caroline – “The challenges we experience in meeting students’ behavioral health needs include:

  • School-based behavioral health (SBBH) needs/referrals outweigh the capacity of CCPS
  • Difficulties in recruiting and hiring qualified behavioral health therapists for school and
  • Difficulties connecting students to behavioral health services due to lack of parent involvement and follow-through, parent/child refusal, transportation and other barriers.
  • Caroline County is a resource-poor area for standard and specialized behavioral health services.
  • The need for contracted SBBH providers to increase their presence and become more infused into school buildings/routines/meetings and culture.”

and contracted providers to respond and ensure a timely connection to services. There are currently waitlists at 5 of the 9 CCPS Schools. CCPS has seen an increase in total SBBH referrals from 286 for the 20/21 school year, to 434 for the 21/22 school year, and referrals are currently on track to exceed those numbers this year as well. There have also been waitlists in many community-based provider offices in the area as well, some reaching up to 6 months.

community-based providers result in waitlists for some SBBH, and difficulty connecting waitlisted students with alternative community-based services.

Carroll – “The behavioral health needs of our students are rising with the need for social, emotional, and

behavioral supports increasing in frequency, duration, and intensity across all grade levels. Due to limited resources within CCPS, MOUs have been established with Advanced Behavioral Health (ABH) and Life Renewal Services (LRS) to provide therapy to students at school with Medical Assistance (MA). Although the MOUs enable these agencies to serve all schools in the county, those agencies do not have enough therapists to fully cover the needs in all schools. As of 11/28/22, there were five schools that did not have one or both agencies supporting students with MA at school during the school day. There is a significant need for families who are insured or under-insured to receive behavioral health services, but there are long wait lists and CCPS currently does not permit our partner agencies to serve students without MA at school. To address this significant need, CCPS has developed several contracts to provide services outside of school.”

Cecil – “Challenges include:

  • Lack of trained mental health providers.
  • Volume of student behavioral health needs.
  1. Family substance use/abuse that impacts student behavioral health, physical health.
  2. Caregiver ability to understand their child’s behavior health needs and how to find resources.
  3. Poverty
  4. Neglect
  5. Pandemic related issues [such as] Families navigating their work lives at home, while children are also home; lack of socialization with peers and adults; loss of loved ones; loss of income.
  • Funding to hire staff to meet the needs of students.
  • Discipline first” in schools to get things settled and instruction-ready; schools dealing with immediate crisis can make it difficult to meet behavioral health needs.
  • Lack of school staff understanding/awareness of student behavior/mental health.

Strategies to overcome these challenges:

  • Professional development to increase school staff understanding of behavioral health needs and how to address them within the school setting.
  • Additional staff (School Mental Health Professionals) who are licensed social workers who support the social and emotional needs of students in schools with high concentrations of poverty; they also provide professional development and support when specific needs arise in any school.”

Charles – “Post pandemic, CCPS, like many of our other Maryland systems, is struggling to meet the myriad social-emotional needs of our returning to in-person learning students. CCPS has seen an increase in severe behavioral incidents, threat assessments, and referrals for mental health services. We are currently using multiple funding sources to increase mental health staffing and put programs in place to address these needs.

Staff strategies include the following:

  • SY22-23 Grant from Charles County Department of Health to fund two Mental Health Clinician
  • SY22-23 Three Behavioral Support Teacher positions created to assist with rising behavioral concerns with K-2 students.
  • SY 22-23 regionalized sites staffed with a teacher and IA to work with referred K-2 students presenting significant behavioral challenges.
  • SY21-22 Four and a half school counselor positions added to general budget.
  • On-going agreement with community mental health agency to provide mental health services in all schools. Between 12-16 contractor mental clinicians receive referrals from schools to provide intensive mental health services to students in K-12 grade.”

Dorchester – “Challenge: Schools following different procedures relative to tiered behavioral supports. Solution: District Social Emotional Learning (SEL) Leadership Team will develop a framework for the consistent implementation of the following supports: PBIS, Conscious Discipline and Zones of Regulation across Tiers 1, 2 and 3. This framework will accompany the existing DCPS Behavior MTSS Flip Book (linked artifact). DCPS is committed to a districtwide approach to address common social emotional and behavioral mental health through preventative instruction, support, reinforcement of self-management and replacement behaviors, and restorative practices to address the trauma and root causes of behavior.”

Frederick – “The behavioral health needs of our students currently exceed staff capacity in both volume and intensity across school levels. We continue to prioritize behavioral health positions in the FCPS operating budget to address these increasing needs. Additionally, we have enhanced community partnerships to provide in-school therapeutic support for students, doubling the number of providers authorized to access students in school during the school day. One focus continues to be the utilization of FCPS trauma therapists to provide support for students with significant exposure to Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACES). Alternative educational opportunities have been expanded or enhanced for students at all school levels. At the elementary level, the Delta program has been expanded to five regional sites serving a total of 16 schools. Delta supports students in K-2 who are not responding to building level behavior interventions and are struggling to demonstrate age-expected social regulation. Other enhancements at the elementary level include music and animal-assisted therapy. Examples of secondary enhancements include leadership development, therapeutic supports, professional learning, trauma informed care, service-learning opportunities, and positive behavioral support initiatives.”

Garrett – “GCPS faces the following challenges in implementing Behavioral Health Services:

  • GCPS has twelve schools spread out over the largest county in Maryland along with one of the smallest student populations which is declining. These factors play a huge factor in providing the behavioral supports and specialized staff to meet the students and families growing needs.
  • Limited behavioral support staff: Not every school has a School Social Worker, School Psychologist, Behavior Coach or Board Certified Behavior Analyst (BCBA). We have four Social Workers, two School Psychologists, four Behavior Coaches and two BCBAs to serve the twelve schools.
  • Lack of types of services: Garrett County does not have a child psychologist in-county; an in-patient health provider in county; a non-public school in school in-county (limited continuum of educational services); [and] lack of in-patient beds and facilities for students in crisis.
  • Inconsistencies in school-based capacity to support students with behavioral health needs.
  • Inconsistencies in implementation of Social-Emotional Learning (SEL) within the school day.
  • Building space for behavioral health providers to have confidential and comfortable areas to work with students in some schools.”

Harford – “The challenges HCPS experience in meeting students’ behavioral health needs are: the overall availability of mental health services in the community, long wait times from referral to the commencement of services, ongoing stigma associated with accessing mental health services, and families who experience barriers to accessing services in the community, especially those families who are uninsured. HCPS works closely with the local Office on Mental Health to provide school-based mental health services in school buildings. HCPS has developed working relationships with 10 outpatient mental health clinics to provide services to students during the school day in our buildings. This practice removes barriers for those families that struggle to access behavioral health services in the larger community. In some instances, school-based services are accessed with greater ease than families navigating the behavioral system on their own. In most cases, this availability of these services limits wait-times from referral to service delivery. To address service availability, HCPS is considering a partnership with a third-party care coordination organization that will work with families to locate behavioral health resources to support the mental health of students. This would be a no-cost resource offered to families.”

Howard – “HCPSS has needed to expand staffing and other supports to address the growing needs of students that have resulted from trauma related to the pandemic. HCPSS has leveraged grant funds and operating dollars to increase the number of programmatic school social workers (18 social workers serving that role) and other school mental health professionals to reduce high caseloads for school system staff and approach the staff-to-student ratios recommended by national social work, school psychologist, and school counseling professional organizations. HCPSS’ primary intervention to address the aforementioned challenges has been advocacy for the expansion of the HCPSS School-Based Mental Health Program, delivered with the assistance of our school social workers. HCPSS has used grant funds from community partners to accelerate expansion of the program to address pressing student needs. Delivery of therapeutic services in schools during the school day helps to remove barriers to access for students and families in HCPSS schools. HCPSS partners with local behavioral health agencies who provide therapists who come into the school buildings to work with students. These partnerships help to address the needs of students with complex behavioral and mental health needs…”

Kent – “Challenges that exist with meeting student’s behavioral health needs are financial barriers, lack of mental health care professionals/services, limited availability of mental health education/awareness, time, and transportation. To assist with these challenges KCPS has applied for grants and partnered with our stakeholders such as local mental health agencies, the Kent County Health Department, and the Kent County Local Care Team, which includes wrap-around services, and the Kent County Department of Social Services. We have employed school social workers to work with students exhibiting behavioral needs in four out of five of our schools. They conduct small group and individual counseling services.”

Montgomery – “There are three significant challenges facing MCPS with regard to meeting students’ behavioral health needs: the increases in student social-emotional and mental health needs since the pandemic; the availability of mental health professionals to meet those needs; and the challenge of destigmatizing and raising awareness of mental health and its impact on students across all stakeholder groups and communities. It is noteworthy that these needs are not unique to MCPS. More than 61,000 of our 150,000+ MCPS students were surveyed regarding socio-emotional and mental health needs. They reported that stress and anxiety, family conflict, and communication were among their top concerns. MCPS has taken a multipronged approach to addressing these challenges. By prioritizing funding to support student well-being needs, MCPS has increased specialized staffing to support student behavior health needs. This includes the addition of 14 parent community coordinators, 44 part-time elementary counselors, 16 part-time middle school counselors, 16 high school counselors, and 7 emergent multilingual therapeutic counselors. Between December 2021 and December 2022, MCPS has created and hired 40 well-being social workers and one social work supervisor to provide direct counseling support, case management, and resource provisioning to students within their local school communities.”

Prince George’s – “Challenges:

  • Staffing mental health positions (school counselors, school psychologists, and mental health clinicians).
  • Increased student need for mental health supports post-pandemic – Readjusting to in-person learning has taken longer than expected.
  • PGCPS has seen the impact of the increased percentage of chronically absent students. Currently, PGCPS is exploring the reasons for increased absenteeism and engaging in parent outreach to provide information and strategies related to increasing student attendance.
  • Increased number of challenging behaviors with students in grades PreK-2.
  • Access to mental health resources outside the school system.
  • Increase in students overdosing, particularly on fentanyl.

PGCPS has a comprehensive plan for supporting students’ behavioral health needs through a layered approach that includes: expanding mental health professionals; creating mental health support office; providing staff training; launching telehealth services; screening and data monitoring; providing student training; expanding counseling partnerships; listing community resources; and communicating services and programs to parents/guardians and students. PGCPS’ Behavioral Health Report 2021 and Enhanced and Expanded Behavioral Health Services Mandatory Report November 2022, provide further details on how each component will lend to the exposure of and access to behavioral health programming and services for all students, staff and families in PGCPS.”

Queen Anne’s – “The main challenge is the lack of Behavioral Health providers in our area. The demand for Behavioral Health services is significantly higher than the supply of providers. Other barriers include:

  • Ability to cross state lines (Queen Anne’s County borders the state of Delaware).
  • The amount of responsibilities School Counselors have can limit their ability to provide behavioral health services to all students who need them.

QACPS does however partner with eight community based providers in order to deliver School Based Mental Health (SBMH) services via tele-health and in-person. QACPS provides in-kind space and supports these providers in grant applications to provide additional funding. Additional strategies include:

  • Adding 2 School Counselors for FY23 and 2 more for FY24.
  • Adding two internal Mental Health Professionals for FY23.
  • Adding two internal Social Workers for FY23.
  • Partnership with Community Mediation Upper Shore (CMUS).
  • Tier 1 Social & Emotional Learning.
  • Tier 1-3 Multi Tiered System of Supports (MTSS).
  • Partnership with the Local Management Board (LMB).
  • Referral process for community programs such as Healthy Transitions.
  • Mobile Response Stabilization Service (MRSS).
  • Anti Bullying presentations – Rachel’s Challenge.
  • Social Media Safety Programs – Organization for Social Media Safety.”

St. Mary’s – “Challenges that impact meeting students’ behavioral health needs include a significant increase in the number and severity of student mental health concerns and limited availability of funding to hire adequate staff to support all schools within the district. Currently, eight secondary schools have a full-time social worker providing mental health counseling support to students and four School Social Workers serving 8 elementary schools. There are 10 elementary schools and two program locations uncovered/unsupported due to lack of funding. School counselors and school psychologists address needs as appropriate in these schools and share community resources with families. Ongoing efforts are made to seek out funding opportunities to expand services to all school sites and programs. We have utilized grant funding to secure all current School Social Work staff that focus on Tier 3 1:1 (ongoing, individual mental health counseling) student supports. The School Social Work positions are dedicated to mental health supports for students. In addition, SMCPS partners with a community agency to provide clinical counseling services for four schools (two elementary and two middle) serving students with state insurance 1-2 days per week.”

Somerset – “There are systemic and school-wide challenges that impact students receiving services for their behavioral health needs. Systemic barriers include: lack of transportation, language barriers, teacher shortage, lack of diversity in available therapists, and lack of programs or services for students needing a higher level of care. Additional barriers system-wide are stigma about mental health, lack of strategies to support a child with mental health challenges, and an inability to access mental health services due to financial hardship / no insurance. We have addressed some of the systemic concerns internally by providing transportation for needed appointments, providing interpreter services for families where language is a barrier, as well as community based small group interventions. Mental health courses are made available to decrease the stigma and provide strategies to staff, families, and community members. To overcome the challenge of teacher shortage and encourage retention we have provided competitive salaries and retention bonuses. School-wide barriers include limited space for mental health providers to meet with students, and limited Professional Development related to student behavioral health. Additionally, staff buy-in, and student-staff relationships impact students receiving behavioral health support.”

Talbot – “In Talbot County, the current local demand for behavioral health services greatly exceeds the availability of current practitioners to manage. In response to the lack of available organizational partnerships, TCPS hired ten school-based social workers to supplement the void in contractual positions. These social workers provide essential support to students on-site at each school, which is supported through grant-funding. We are currently exploring how to incorporate additional behavioral health positions into our local budget to provide students with increased necessary resources to ensure their wellbeing. While there are not many Behavioral Health Clinics in the area, TCPS partners with seven private/community-based health agencies that have contracted an additional ten licensed Mental Health Clinicians that provide services to students all year internal and external to TCPS facilities. When schools are not in session (evenings, weekends, summer), however, the lack of TCPS transportation further challenges the ability to provide these necessary services to students living in geographically rural areas of Talbot County. TCPS acknowledges this concern and is currently discussing ways in which this issue can be mitigated.”

Washington – “The challenges WCPS experiences in meeting student’s behavioral health needs include: lack of transportation for families to access services, uninsured or under-insured students, limited resources in the community, access to services in school and the community, difficulty recruiting independently licensed/experienced school system clinical staff; stigma; increase in K-5 behavioral health needs; limited level of care options for high risk/ aggressive students; parental involvement; and meeting the continuing training needs of staff. During the summer months, outside providers continue services. If students are referred to Student Services by WCPS staff during the summer due to behavioral health concerns, Student Services staff work with home school staff and family to coordinate outside community resources. An additional challenge is that due to summer schedules, parents/guardians are not always able to consistently follow through with continuity of services.

Difficulty recruiting independently licensed clinical staff: WCPS created and hired a social work specialist to provide clinical supervision so staff can achieve a higher level of licensure and increase clinical skills. This position also covers open positions, provides troubleshooting, and delivers professional development.”

Wicomico – “The difficulties we face in meeting students’ behavioral health needs are as follows: WCPS adolescent families and caregivers must overcome numerous barriers to gain access to outpatient and inpatient rural behavioral health treatments. Obstacles can be of the familial, clinical, or socioeconomic variety. Even though demand for services has steadily increased over the last ten years, the current treatment options have significant limitations. Long wait times are frequently cited as the most significant barrier to receiving assistance. Reduced food, housing, and financial security as a result of the pandemic, as well as increased trauma and stress, have either triggered or exacerbated pre-existing mental health issues in vulnerable individuals.

The strategies utilized include:

  • Training(s) on the use of the universally available Behavioral Toolkit, developed by school psychologists, occurs for all teachers, giving them access to the resource listing for all disabilities and proactive strategies for classroom management and instruction of students with these unique needs.
  • Elementary school counselors are continuing to teach the Second Step social-emotional curriculum for PreK to 5th Grade (topics include recognizing emotions, how to establish friendships, bullying prevention, child protection, self-control, etc.).”

Worcester – “The challenges that exist in meeting students’ behavioral health needs are:

  • Workforce recruitment and retention for school social workers and community treatment providers.
  • Community Treatment providers’ fee-for-service funding structure limits time to provide case management and collaboration with multidisciplinary school team.
  • Absence of specialized therapy services (i.e., Spanish and other language therapists, therapy services for non-verbal students, ABA therapy, Functional Family Therapy).
  • Finite number of designated confidential space for school-based therapy services from outside providers.
  • Decreased parental involvement in school-based therapy models that limit progress and generalization of skills.
  • Ongoing stigma from caregivers about their child participating in behavioral health treatment.

[WCPS] seeks to overcome these challenges by working with Salisbury University School of Social Work to support workforce development. Beginning in 2023, WCPS’s Career Fair will include specific outreach for social workers and behavioral health professionals. WCPS hosts quarterly meetings of the School Behavioral Health Council to collaborate with community stakeholders on community behavioral health trends, needs, and effective practices. WCPS is in communication with community partners to discuss and seek grant opportunities to offset costs to allow providers to be more flexible within their fee-for-service structure, and partnership with our local health department on awareness and prevention efforts.”

Click through to read earlier roundups of Blueprint reform efforts on college and career readiness, expanding early childhood education, and efforts to hire high-quality and diverse educators.

by William J. Ford

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.